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Jun. 4th, 2007 07:22 amWell I've been away for a good while here. A few words to explain so yall know what's been keeping me away. Last week my daughter got married. So there was a wedding to plan, and of course there was a spot of depression happening there too. She's my youngest and well self pity creeps in about the age thing, yeah I was feeling rather old here. I've also backed away some from fandom and when I started this LJ and all that it was a way to communicate with HP fans and meet them online. Back in da old days it was mail lists(and I was on a few of those), with HP it's been LJ for a good little while. So, I got the LJ and happily communicated and staked out my little corner of the fandom and had lots of fun there. I also probably pissed some people off too. Never at the level some others do, because I am after all very small potatoes here, but yeah I know I've pissed people off at times.
Anyways, last October I went to Minnesota to visit an old college buddy from my Munich days and I didn't even turn on a computer. Had loads of fun but no computer, no Internets and when I came back I just kinda stayed away from HP fandom. I pretty much went back to an older fandom interest I had and revisited and yes it was very fun to go back and devour Voyager fandom and reread what was shocking 10 yrs ago and realise how not shocking it is now. Two men in a bed? Shocking back then. But two men in a bed now who are consenting willing adults over the age of consent and no whips or chains or watersports or any real kink? Not shocking now. Star Trek was looking back pretty damned vanilla. Sure there were some D/s things and some light BDSM, but nothing like what is being written now. And quite honestly I DO appreciate the warnings fic writers use now. I can avoid the stuff I don't care for. Easily.
So I was away from fandom as in LJ fandoms, and I stayed out for awhile. Part of it was me being depressed because OMG I'm OLD! My youngest kid is getting married! And yes she married a prince with a very nice family, so that's the good part but the bad part was my own feelings of age and all my ambivalence towards aging and the ucky stuff that was part of that. I HATE being depressed and I was depressed. And if my daughter reads this(she just might she is on the flist) this isn't about you Baby, it was all me so no worry I am happy for you and I love your new spouse because he's right for you.
I was also doing some stuff in RL that had to be done and I am still doing that so yes I am back but no I DON'T want spoilers on Deathly Hallows, I am still not happy I got the spoilers the day HBP was released that some asshat posted all over LJ concerning Teh Death and who did it. I will watch HP melt down again with popcorn and beer because ya know someone will be peeved that their vision wasn't JKR's vision of how the HP series should go. Well to those who dislike JKR's vision and have your own? Fanfiction. Write it, embrace it and share your vision with us fen on the Internets. I guarantee someone will read it if you post it. Someone will like it enough to tell you, and others will dislike it, and tell you. But write it, because it's your vision.
Revisiting ST was good for me. I am surprised at how much remains out there on the Internet and yes the fandom IS still active, but nowhere near the white heat it was 10yrs ago. Ten yrs ago you couldn't avoid Trek on the Net and now it's still there and a good lot is not active but the sites are still there. And so is the fic. I wonder if HP will be the same in 10 yrs myself, since a good many fans have been jumping to the latest shiny and finding they enjoy a newer fandom whichever fandom it may be. It may be a fandom where some sites are still there but not being updated and some have disappeared. I wonder what LJ will be like in 10 yrs and if it will be as popular as it is now. Okay so with Strikethrough '07 it isn't all that happy right now, but I am betting once the dust settles and it will settle, the fen will keep merrily journaling in LJ and not much will change, except maybe there will be some clearer protocals in place so something like this is prevented.
Speaking of Strikethrough '07, what bothered me about it was how it was done. Not that it was done, but how. I understand Six Apart not wanting anything to do with pedophilia and the glorification of it, but the purge was badly done on their part. And I've read the theory out there that they want to IPO and this threat from the nutjobbers frightened them into summary action. It does sound logical, almost too logical. But yeah someone panicked and we had deletions galore. I said it last week during while it was going on, especially after finding out that INTERESTs where what got some pulled that if interests where the flag, why didn't they take the time to read the LJ involved? Oh yeah that takes time to do and they were in a hurry. But perhaps they should in the future if they are flagging but what's listed in Interests, take a look at the LJ and see what that Interest might actually mean to that LJ. I will say this, Six Apart learned something last week, and so did we users. Not sure exactly what, time will tell there but both entities learned. I hope Six Apart learned caution and I think they did. I really hope the users learned the truth here. Six Apart is a corporation and as such will always move to cover their collective behinds. They need the users but damn they sure don't want the reputation of harboring pedophiles, it's bad for business and they ARE a business. The users are using something that belongs to Six Apart and as long as they remember that, they can coexist. Now the one suggestion I have for Six Apart and yes I CALLED them last week is set up the protocals, make them KNOWN to their userbase and then FOLLOW them. I think they may just do that now. They caught hell last week.
Anyways, last October I went to Minnesota to visit an old college buddy from my Munich days and I didn't even turn on a computer. Had loads of fun but no computer, no Internets and when I came back I just kinda stayed away from HP fandom. I pretty much went back to an older fandom interest I had and revisited and yes it was very fun to go back and devour Voyager fandom and reread what was shocking 10 yrs ago and realise how not shocking it is now. Two men in a bed? Shocking back then. But two men in a bed now who are consenting willing adults over the age of consent and no whips or chains or watersports or any real kink? Not shocking now. Star Trek was looking back pretty damned vanilla. Sure there were some D/s things and some light BDSM, but nothing like what is being written now. And quite honestly I DO appreciate the warnings fic writers use now. I can avoid the stuff I don't care for. Easily.
So I was away from fandom as in LJ fandoms, and I stayed out for awhile. Part of it was me being depressed because OMG I'm OLD! My youngest kid is getting married! And yes she married a prince with a very nice family, so that's the good part but the bad part was my own feelings of age and all my ambivalence towards aging and the ucky stuff that was part of that. I HATE being depressed and I was depressed. And if my daughter reads this(she just might she is on the flist) this isn't about you Baby, it was all me so no worry I am happy for you and I love your new spouse because he's right for you.
I was also doing some stuff in RL that had to be done and I am still doing that so yes I am back but no I DON'T want spoilers on Deathly Hallows, I am still not happy I got the spoilers the day HBP was released that some asshat posted all over LJ concerning Teh Death and who did it. I will watch HP melt down again with popcorn and beer because ya know someone will be peeved that their vision wasn't JKR's vision of how the HP series should go. Well to those who dislike JKR's vision and have your own? Fanfiction. Write it, embrace it and share your vision with us fen on the Internets. I guarantee someone will read it if you post it. Someone will like it enough to tell you, and others will dislike it, and tell you. But write it, because it's your vision.
Revisiting ST was good for me. I am surprised at how much remains out there on the Internet and yes the fandom IS still active, but nowhere near the white heat it was 10yrs ago. Ten yrs ago you couldn't avoid Trek on the Net and now it's still there and a good lot is not active but the sites are still there. And so is the fic. I wonder if HP will be the same in 10 yrs myself, since a good many fans have been jumping to the latest shiny and finding they enjoy a newer fandom whichever fandom it may be. It may be a fandom where some sites are still there but not being updated and some have disappeared. I wonder what LJ will be like in 10 yrs and if it will be as popular as it is now. Okay so with Strikethrough '07 it isn't all that happy right now, but I am betting once the dust settles and it will settle, the fen will keep merrily journaling in LJ and not much will change, except maybe there will be some clearer protocals in place so something like this is prevented.
Speaking of Strikethrough '07, what bothered me about it was how it was done. Not that it was done, but how. I understand Six Apart not wanting anything to do with pedophilia and the glorification of it, but the purge was badly done on their part. And I've read the theory out there that they want to IPO and this threat from the nutjobbers frightened them into summary action. It does sound logical, almost too logical. But yeah someone panicked and we had deletions galore. I said it last week during while it was going on, especially after finding out that INTERESTs where what got some pulled that if interests where the flag, why didn't they take the time to read the LJ involved? Oh yeah that takes time to do and they were in a hurry. But perhaps they should in the future if they are flagging but what's listed in Interests, take a look at the LJ and see what that Interest might actually mean to that LJ. I will say this, Six Apart learned something last week, and so did we users. Not sure exactly what, time will tell there but both entities learned. I hope Six Apart learned caution and I think they did. I really hope the users learned the truth here. Six Apart is a corporation and as such will always move to cover their collective behinds. They need the users but damn they sure don't want the reputation of harboring pedophiles, it's bad for business and they ARE a business. The users are using something that belongs to Six Apart and as long as they remember that, they can coexist. Now the one suggestion I have for Six Apart and yes I CALLED them last week is set up the protocals, make them KNOWN to their userbase and then FOLLOW them. I think they may just do that now. They caught hell last week.
